Elmer Lee Thomas
Living With The Blues
© 2003 Elmer Lee Thomas
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Elmer Lee Thomas knew by the age of six that music would be a big part of his life. His mother, a member of the Gateway Singers Folk Group, often brought the young Thomas along on their national tours. And Thomas states that he was surrounded by all kinds of music growing up: By the Gateway Singers rehearsing in their living room, his father's country blues recordings, the Grand Ol' Opry on the radio, and the Texas-style blues played at family gatherings. This musical atmosphere is most likely the source of his life-long facination with stringed instruments, especially the guitar.
Heavily influenced by James Brown and Jimi Hendrix, Thomas spent the first ten years of his professional music carreer as a guitar player and vocalist for various funk and R&B groups. Thomas eventually ended up touring for most of the seventies before dropping out of the music business in 1978 to work for the airline industry. It was during this seven year absence from the stage that Thomas began playing acoustic music seriously. By the time he purchased his first national steel guitar in 1985 Elmer Lee Thomas was clearly on his way back to his acoustic roots. Thomas remembers: I played a lot by myself, never getting back in a band, until the begining of the 90's...That's when I started playing full time, acousticly, by myself.
By 1990 Elmer Lee Thomas was playing the folk-blues venues locally, and giving Friday afternoon concerts with the Bay Area Blues Society. During this transition period he states he was able to get in tune with himself and develope the idea for an acoustic band, which was also inspired by Thomas' childhood experiences. ...when people would come over to the house, they would all get together and play whatever instruments they had. And most of the times there wasn't any drums around. [But] there were some kind of string instruments. for me, one of the biggest motivating factors was [that] this is black music, this is what we as black people have given to America.
Long-time friends, guitarist London Phillips and bassist Ken Webb, were invited to make up the core of a new group which together with harmonica and female vocalist became the Elmer Lee Thomas Blues Revue in 1991. Soon, they began getting widespread recognition, especially after the release of Acoustic-Lee Yours, their first CD, in 1992. While the CD received nominations for best blues album and "Leavin' Blues" best original song, Elmer Lee Thomas received the South Bay Blues Award for the Best Traditional Blues Artist, and a nomination for Best Male Vocalist in 1993.
Their second CD, released in 1994, saw Elmer Lee Thomas' musical style move toward a more progressive sound. This "delta blues for the 1990s" established him as one of the Bay Area's premier acoustic blues artists and captured the attention of Brownie McGhee who began a close friendship and mentorship with Thomas in late 1994. In 1995, Elmer Lee Thomas and the Blues Revue were responsible for Brownie's reurn to the national stage after a ten year hiatus. Brownie's last album, The Last Great Blues Hero, was recorded with the Elmer Lee Thomas Blues Revue in preparation for an Australian tour, which was canceled when Brownie became ill. By that time, Brownie and Elmer Lee had become inseparable. Brownie McGhee's impact on Elmer Lee Thomas and his music was profound, as seen clearly in this following quote.
"I think it does make a difference where you came up and what your upbringing was. It stays with you. What you've heard, what you've lived, what you've experienced. Especially with blues cause blues is a life experience. Brownie said the blues is truth. But it's a different truth for all of us, ...as individuals we all bring to the blues something that is unique, are own life stories.